Monte Carlo pulling left - Is this right ;)

[capriboy]

Collected my Monte around Xmas and immediately noticed the famous left pull.  Booked it into closest dealer where I was working after the hols and after trying to fob me off with 'it follows the camber sir' eventually took it for tracking.   The day after I collected I rang in and said it was still the same.

 

Fast forward to the end of May and I finally got round to re booking it in.  Had to move the booking back to end of June and it's just been in.  Dealer tells me now that Skoda issued a service bulletin in March for this, advising changing tyres but... as I've done 4.5k Skoda will only cover 50% of the cost.  Further i'm told that they'll be fitting Hankook as there a like for like premium brand.

 

Does this sound right?  I've logged a call to Skoda CS as i'm not happy paying to rectify a fault that was there at purchase and reported when it only had a few hundred miles on it.  

Edited 25 June, 2014 by capriboy

[Ootohere]

It is not right that your car should be pulling left.

It is also not right that you should be paying a single penny towards them correcting the poorly built or aligned car.

 

If you do a quick Keyword search on Briskoda or Google etc

'briskoda fabia mk2 pulling to the left'  should show them.

 

You will find the many Threads on the subject just in this section over the past 3 years.

[capriboy]

It is not right that your car should be pulling left.

 

If you do a quick Keyword search on Briskoda or Google etc

 

You will find the many Threads on the subject just in this section over the past 3 years.

 

 

Yh, I've read most of them  It's the solution that's now being applied (hankook tyres and charging me) that I'm wondering about.

[Ootohere]

It is a Warranty Issue,  for Skoda to rectify.   So pay nothing.  

 

 Get Skoda to have a Qualified Person Inspect & Examine the car.

To diagnose the actual reasons and cause of how it drives.

Or let them get on and change tyres if they know that is the cause.

You bought a car that you expected to drive safely on UK roads, that is for them to sort out @ their Expense.

 

Or you get an Independent Expert Examination & Report done, then you Invoice Skoda.

Invoice them for your time and expenses as well.

They know the reason for the car 'Pulling Left',  they are allowing Dealerships to mess customers about.

 

Do not listen to the Dealership,

they are not footing the bill,

they are being paid by Skoda UK to do the work.

 

??Who in the Dealership is telling you this, The Service Desk staff ?

[capriboy]

It is a Warranty Issue,  for Skoda to rectify.   So pay nothing.  

 

 Get Skoda to have a Qualified Person Inspect & Examine the car.

To diagnose the actual reasons and cause of how it drives.

Or let them get on and change tyres if they know that is the cause.

You bought a car that you expected to drive safely on UK roads, that is for them to sort out @ their Expense.

 

Or you get an Independent Expert Examination & Report done, then you Invoice Skoda.

Invoice them for your time and expenses as well.

They know the reason for the car 'Pulling Left',  they are allowing Dealerships to mess customers about.

 

Do not listen to the Dealership,

they are not footing the bill,

they are being paid by Skoda UK to do the work.

 

??Who in the Dealership is telling you this, The Service Desk staff ?

 

 

Service manager.

[Ootohere]

Get your Case Registered with Skoda UK then.

 

& you could ask the Dealerships 'Service Manager', to talk things over with a Visiting 'Warranty Manager' when he is in to approve other claims.

 

george

[jrw]

1. tyres aren't 50% worn at 4.5k - especially not the rears (mine have done 50k on my Octy).

2. Hankook aren't like for like:

Conti SC5 - £100 approx

Pirelli P Zero - £75 approx

Hankook - £60 approx

Dunlop - £90 Approx

 

Got mine changed funnily enough at 4.5k with no cost to me - get a case logged with Skoda UK and get it done for free.

[Gazbull17]

Got mine replaced with Pirellis, they were FOC by the supplying dealer. TBH, it's better but not perfect.

Sent from my RAZRi using Tapatalk

[capriboy]

1. tyres aren't 50% worn at 4.5k - especially not the rears (mine have done 50k on my Octy).

2. Hankook aren't like for like:

Conti SC5 - £100 approx

Pirelli P Zero - £75 approx

Hankook - £60 approx

Dunlop - £90 Approx

 

Got mine changed funnily enough at 4.5k with no cost to me - get a case logged with Skoda UK and get it done for free.

 

 

Get your Case Registered with Skoda UK then.

 

& you could ask the Dealerships 'Service Manager', to talk things over with a Visiting 'Warranty Manager' when he is in to approve other claims.

 

george

 

 

Got mine replaced with Pirellis, they were FOC by the supplying dealer. TBH, it's better but not perfect.

Sent from my RAZRi using Tapatalk

 

 

Thanks, I've logged a call with Skoda, who helpfully have just called back to say there investigating and will get back to me within 48hrs.  They did say they've no record on file re the 50% contribution but that could have been 'agreed' with another department...  but that if so given the age and history it's something they would likely look at.  Agree completely re wear at 4.5k - that was my next 'argument' should I get no joy from this route.

 

Not sure where I'm going to stand with the hankooks though :/  I went VAG this time as my local BMW dealer was, shall we say, very less than helpful with my 118D both under warranty and out of it (with the sharp crank teeth) - so far kudos to Skoda CS...

[Ootohere]

I just wish that Alisdair Stewart Brand Director Skoda UK would have Skoda UK HQ investigate the Official Skoda Dealerships Service Managers & Staff at Service Desks 

& the guff that they come away with to customers.

So many recurring issues, Tyres, Suspension, Engines, Gearboxes on a variety of Skoda models in the UK.

 

Customers have legitimate problems and issues, sometimes lots of customers, and the technical department of Skoda know the issues and how to resolve them, They even send out to Dealerships how to deal with the issues,

yet customers time and money is wasted at Skoda Dealerships.

 

Its like they just make it up as they go along often.

[R4zb3rry]

Dunlops replaced by pirellis at 6.5k for me, however I'm doing approx 1.5-2k a month so the timing wasn't very long.

[The Plumber]

We were back and forth to the dealer over a period of months with ours, not helped by me fitting 15" winters straight after delivery (got charged for a wheel balance on the dealers first look at the issue due to the non factory fit wheels, albeit they were Skoda supplied).

 

However after three goes at tracking, various 'musical chairs' with the factory tyres and rims during the late spring, Skoda authorised the ditching of the Dunlop's for Pirelli's at no cost. Car was around 7 months old by then and I would think we'd have covered 5 to 6k, albeit some of that on winter rubber.

 

Regard brand of tyre, then I suppose that's down to Skoda; dealer in our case suggested the Pirelli tyres were supplied by the Skoda parts network, as they had none in stock of the correct size.

 

Hankook's are an approved factory fit brand within the VAG group, although I've only seen them fitted to Fabia S and SE levels of trim.

 

 

TP

[Ootohere]

If it is Hankooks that are fitted,

 they will be 205/40 17 of the correct Load/Speed rating, so hardly a problem there surely.

 

  But then the Dealer or someone at the Dealers could have thought they could fit what they liked.

after all they thought they could get away with surcharging 50 % of the cost.

 

Changing the tyres is not resolving the underlying problem anyway, unless that problem was tyres fitted as pairs  have the wrong Runout.

Changing tyres for ones that hide the symptom & affect still leaves the cars alignment at fault.

[multiskoda]

Just resurrecting this, as like "The Plumber", my situation has been confused by a combination of winter tyres and Dealer-supplied Pirellis to mask the problem.

 

I've recently got sick of the crashy ride that cheap Monte suspension + low profile tyres brings, so have swapped my 17" Monte wheels for my wife's 15" Rapid wheels. The ride is much better but the pulling-to-the-left is back.

 

I had an alignment done at the dealers, plus one at an independent specialist, but that was several months ago now. Car is less than a year old and on 11K miles.

 

I had exactly the same issue on my winters, but they really are half worn and I managed to 'cure' the problem by shuffling the tyres onto different wheels..

 

Has anyone actually got to the root of the problem yet? Or do I need to go back to the dealers? Problem now is I'm almost 100% certain they'll tell me that it's because I've got worn tyres (actually only about 3000 miles on these tyres, but that won't stop them), and/or "they're Rapid wheels sir".

[Jabozuma]

Car "pulling to one side" has nothing to do with the tyres and is down to either chassis being not straight or suspension settings incorrect.

There are laser rigs for checking chassis geometry.

 

http://www.ika.rwth-aachen.de/forschung/veroeffentlichung/1998/1998-3/index_en.php

 

Anybody checked camber and caster on your car? You should have a full report, looking something like that

 

http://mbworld.org/forums/4252067-post12.html

[multiskoda]

Yup. All been checked. Three times, twice independently. That's what's puzzling....

If the geometry is right that suggests something about the suspension favours the left hand side, like... Greater friction on one side versus the other maybe? Or steering rack faulty? I'm no engineer so don't know where to start but going back to the dealers for yet more geometry tests (where they actually make it worse because they don't know what they're doing) seems pointless.

[Jabozuma]

Don't go to the dealers, go independwd garage with Hunter machine. Steering rack is a possibility of course but I thought it was already looked at?

[multiskoda]

Not had the rack inspected. Had two checks done on hunter machines independently. That was a few months back though so I guess I should get it checked before I speak to the dealers so I can prove it's not alignment/geometry... Guh...

Edited 14 July, 2014 by louisv6

[The Plumber]

Ours now tends to drive pretty straight but is quite prone to following the camber, either left or right plus reacting to other imperfections in the road surface, less so though on 15" winters (Uniroyal directional).

 

Tyre wear across the Pirellis currently looks pretty even too, both front and back, a year on from the last track at the dealers and the replacement of the Dunlop's.

 

 

TP

[Carlodiesel]

louisv6

Has anyone actually got to the root of the problem yet? Or do I need to go back to the dealers? Problem now is I'm almost 100% certain they'll tell me that it's because I've got worn tyres (actually only about 3000 miles on these tyres, but that won't stop them), and/or "they're Rapid wheels sir".

 

Had this for over a year.

In the end the Dealer had a Skoda Technician down from London to sort 2 cars out.

The Skoda guy told the dealers Service manager all was done.

No one in the dealership road tested the car. They took his word it was done.

The 4 tyres they fitted 3000 miles previous (P zero's) had been replaced again, as the 2 front had worn badly on the inner edge.

I took the car home holding onto the steering wheel just as before. It was marginally better but that was all.

Anyway I have now cured the pulling.

 

 

 

 

I traded the car back to the dealer,.................almost got my money back....so now I'm in a Yeti

Still got the 1.6 diesel, 105 bhp & getting 62 mpg. Road tax nil them £30yr.

I kick myself now for not rejecting the car right from the start. Specially after the 3rd time realignment.

I just knew there was a problem, but gave them the benefit every time....Not Again. 

 

Take it from me, its NOT the TYRES. The car has a fault. Where I don't know, But I bet Skoda do.

CD

 

[multiskoda]

Carlo - do you mind if I ask what tactics you used to extract the most trade-in from your dealer? Or were they just sympathetic?

[multiskoda]

OK, problem resolved, just in time for me to realise I hate driving a manual, and I'm getting rid of the car anyway.

 

For those that want a car that drives in a straight line, make sure your friendly geometry centre sticks to these PRECISELY.

 

 

It seems that these cars are particularly sensitive to geometry/alignment/tyres all working together, but mine now drives arrow straight.

 

 

Thanks (once again - they sorted a particularly wonky Merc for me once as well) to Wheels-in-motion in Chesham for sorting me out.

 

Hope this helps anyone who hasn't yet sold their car out of frustration! 

 

I should probably add that at times I've been adamant there was something wrong with the car. It might still be the case, but all I can say is that with the above settings it drives perfectly straight. I did find that on another set of wheels it pulled to the left slightly, but those tyres had done 8K miles and when I put them back on the donor car, I realised that also pulled to the left slightly - so most likely tyre related. I think once you've got the Fabia pulling-paranoia it's hard to not notice every little twitch!

 

Note though that the above setup might not be to everyone's taste. It perhaps drives straighter than most factory fresh cars, as most will have a natural left-hand camber bias (which this doesn't).

[Ootohere]

Bump for Seboni121, 

just one of many threads on the subject.

[seboni121]

Bump for Seboni121, 

just one of many threads on the subject.

Thanx George

[The Sheddragger]

We've just bought a 5month old Monte Carlo that has less than 600 miles on the clock that also pulls to the left, took it back today and mentioned this thread especially the service bulletin, the first question asked was 'what tyres are on it?' Fair play to the garage Blade Skoda in Gloucester, they booked it in for repair without any problems. Thanks again and fingers crossed it gets cured.